Synopsis: An Interlude of Sin

She’d been a child of privilege; she dreamed of being a respectable woman. The life she desired would be within her grasp, if not for An Interlude of Sin.

The notorious pirate Calico Jack Rackham hangs from a gibbet, and his sea faring pirate lover, Anne Bonny, disappears into the mists of history. This novel takes up the question of what happened to Anne after her forced retirement from the pirate's life.

Two men know her secret past. Two men want her dead.

And more, she holds a secret neither man knows. A secret which she'll give her own life to protect.

As a pirate she swore she would surrender to no man; as a woman she discovers how sweet surrender can be.

CHAPTER 1
England, April 1725
The rough hemp rope pulled tauter against the tender flesh of her throat. She clawed and struggled to free herself, but it did no good. She dragged in harsh, rasping breaths, but little air reached her burning lungs.

Surrounding her, drowning out even the pounding of her blood in her ears, she heard the jeering cries of the crowds.

“Jackie boy won’t save you now, bitch!”
“Put her in a gibbet and let her swing next to her lover!”
“Let the hellcat hang!”

Worse—far worse—was the stench. The mingled scent of unwashed bodies, cloaked with too much perfume. It did no good. No amount of plundered scents could cover the rotten smell of death.

Jack’s death.
Mary’s death.
And now, in minutes, her own.

Anne screamed one last time and sprang up in her bed. She clawed at her braided hair, wrapped like a noose around her neck.

Her hair. Only her hair. She wrenched it free and drew a long shuddered breath.
Damn it! It had been so much easier when her hair had been cut short, tucked under a cap, or barely ruffling in the wind, on the deck of a ship under full sail. It had never strangled her in her sleep then; it had never wrapped around her throat like the noose she’d so narrowly escaped.

The heavy oak bedroom door slammed open. She leapt from the bed in a single motion, seizing the dagger that rarely lay beyond arm’s reach.

“Damn it Anne! What the hell is that caterwauling? Are you all right?”

Anne stared at the man in the doorway. She breathed hard and rubbed her eyes to wipe away the last of the cobwebs left by the nightmare.

She had no problem seeing who stood there. She never slept without the lamp burning. Even in the low light it cast, and in spite of her still slightly dazed state, she recognized him. Her terror transformed instantly into fury.

“Blast it, Mr. Radcliffe, ye come on me like that again, and ye’ll likely find yerself with a few new holes in yer hide!”

She stopped and drew several deep breaths, steadying herself. Her thin white nightgown, drenched in sweat, clung to her. She pulled it away from her skin irritably.

“What I meant to say, Mr. Radcliffe, is that you startled me. I’m sorry. I’m fine. Just a nightmare.”

Anne pushed her damp hair off her forehead and closed her eyes. She knew the proper way to speak. She’d been raised in a fine household, by an educated man, and had herself been given the finest education available to young ladies. So how had her speech been so degraded by only two years in the company of…? She shook her head. She knew the answer. More than once her ability to blend in had saved her life. It would save her again, if she could only remember who she was supposed to be now.